


devour me (if you really think that you can stomach me)

by gaily-daily (passionateartist)



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, This was supposed to be a PWP, and i dont even know who's supposed to be narrating anymore, and now it's a fuck or die fic without the actual sex scene, but then it kept changing POVs, everyone is disturbed by the turn of events, except joker, fuck or die au, he's have the time of his life, how in the hell, like what
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-01
Updated: 2017-04-01
Packaged: 2018-10-13 14:18:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10515477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/passionateartist/pseuds/gaily-daily
Summary: “It’s okay.” Dicks says in a rushed tone. Though he cannot quite look Bruce in the eye. “It’s not your fault.”Bruce nods, unable to do much of anything else. He would stand if he thought he could handle it. But the truth of it was, Bruce is terrified that if he moves again he’ll end up forcing himself upon whoever was closest to him. Be it Joker or Dick or Barbara.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I cannot recall ever reading a fuck or die au for the batjokes fandom before. Either way, hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it!
> 
> BTW title is from Every Other Freckle by Alt-J in case you're wondering :)

It was supposed to be routine. The plan had been solid. But then again, Barbara doesn’t really know what she had been expecting. Plans rarely go so perfectly especially in their profession. 

Harley and Poison Ivy had escaped. Though at least they had managed to catch the Joker. If anything Barbara would rather have him in their custody then Harley and Ivy combined. He was 10 times more dangerous and crazy than either of them. 

“Having trouble there, darling?” Joker giggles from his restraints.

“Shut up.”

Normally Barbara would agree with Bruce’s sentiments, but she cannot ignore the way his pace has gotten significantly getting slower. He was almost struggling to drag the Joker along. Something was wrong. 

She curses that the Batwing had been destroyed. Ivy’s plants had made short work of it before quickly creating a massive barrier. The plants were thicker than ever and impossible to get through. Barbara hopes they’ll cut through the growth to the other side soon. 

Dick slows his pace till he’s beside her. “You thinking what I’m thinking?” He says quietly between Batman’s labored breathes and Joker’s muffled laughing.

“That it was a trap given how Ivy put up a barrier only _after_ we’d made it to the building?” She responds. “That Batman is acting like he’s about to collapse even though we won that fight fairly easily?”

Dick purses his lips and gives Bruce another concerned look. “So you noticed it too.”

“Of course I did!” She whispers a little too harshly just as Bruce sucks in a sharp gasp for air and pauses mid-step.

Dick and Barbara share a look, one they’ve shared for years, and by now is something that is wholly theirs. Dicks breaks away first. 

Bruce feels Dick approach more than he hears it. Inside, his body flares violently—achingly—but on the outside he forces himself still. Painfully, painfully still.

“Hey, you okay?” Dick raises his hand to place is on Bruce’s shoulder when the other man flinches away as if stung. 

Dick’s eyes widen. But he does not reach out again.

“No. I’m not.” Bruce manages to growl out. “Ivy...she hit me with something.”

Barbara takes a cautious step forward, as if Bruce will flinch away from her too. “We’ll make it back to the cave. The antidote will—“

“This is different.” It comes out with a snap. With the force of a backhand across the cheek. Almost at once Bruce looks regretful. He stops, breathing in like it hurts, and then continues. “I’m familiar with most her poisons but—this is beyond anything she’s ever done.”

Worry punches a hole into Barbara’s gut. Different how? What was it doing to Bruce? What were his current symptoms? They needed to get back as soon as possible and diagnose the problem. 

Alfred had sent out a remote-piloted jet to their location about 10 minutes ago. It should be here soon but it wouldn’t do any good until they got to a clearing.

“Here, let me.” Dick grips the Joker’s shoulder and pulls him away from Bruce. The other man barely reacts. Barbara does not take it as a good sign.

The inside of Bruce’s mind is hot and jumbled. How long have they been walking anyway? 5 minutes? An hour? He’s not sure.

Dick takes the lead with the Joker in tow as Barbara walks alongside Bruce. He is grateful she keeps her distance. She wants to reach out but senses something is off. Smart girl. So smart. Bruce is so lucky to have her on his team.

With each step his blood boils hotter. It’s getting harder to breathe. Like his lungs are rejecting the very air. Bruce knows what aphrodisiacs feel like. And this did not feel like an aphrodisiac. It felt like a goddamn bomb. Every single part of his body was screaming for sex. Any minute now he’d either keel over and die, or rut against the first warm body he could get his hands on. 

Bruce staggers. Barbara is so close. So close. It’d be so easy to reach out. He could touch her, he knew she’d let him. 

He brutally stamps the thought away. This was his partner. Gordon’s daughter. Barbara was family. He didn’t want to sleep with her. He couldn’t.

Joker chuckles from his binds. “Having fun over there Bats? Looks like Ivy did a number on you.”

Batman growls, coming out more predatory than he’d meant it to. Joker’s eyes glint in delight, like he knows exactly what’s going on inside Bruce’s body. 

“You know what she did to me.” Batman states. It isn’t a question.

“Of course I know!” His laughter is cut short when Dick grabs his collar and hisses into his face. 

“What do you know?” He shakes the giggling man. “What did she do to him?!”

“You won’t be able to mix up an antidote for that particular perfume honey!” Joker wiggles in Nightwing’s grip. “I’ve seen it firsthand. You’re starting to sweat aren’t you? Starting to feel it take over!”

“What is happening to him?” Barbara demands. She steps forward angrily, as if to smack the clown. But Joker chuckles, giving up the information easily.

“It’s a _lovely_ little concoction.” He says. But he’s not talking to Batgirl. His eyes are fixed on Batman’s hunched over form. “It takes over the body. Making your loins ache and your bones shake. If you don’t fuck someone within the hour, it’ll take your mind and you’ll rip yourself to pieces in pleasurable agony. Quite literally actually. You should have seen the guy we tested it on! Now that was what I call a show!”

Dick and Barbara still. Frozen with disgust and disbelief. Bruce groans from where he stands. He cannot bring himself to look into either of their eyes. 

Cautiously, Barbara comes closer. “Batman, are you—do you need—“

“I’m _fine_.” Bruce hisses. “It’s only been about fifteen minutes since she doused me. We can still make it back to make an antidote.”

Barbara purses her lips. She exchanges a look with Nightwing. Bruce knows they’re doing the calculations in their heads. Can see them thinking about the time it takes to create a brand new antidote for an unknown concoction. 

But they also both knew how stubborn he could be. Bruce would no doubt refuse all advances, insisting that he could make it. Time and time again Bruce had escaped death before. Why should now be any different?

So they say nothing. 

Five minutes later Bruce falls against a tree. Trying desperately to remain upright. The sounds escaping his throat are those of a dying man scrambling to maintain control of his body and his sanity.

“Batman!” Dick turns, worry thick in his voice. It is this moment the Joker strikes. He shoves the other man away and bolts underneath a small opening in a patch of thorns. 

Had Bruce been thinking clearly, he would have let Barbara or Dick run after the Joker. They were fierce and competent, and Bruce had faith in them to get the Joker under control. But all Bruce could feel was the steady pounding, endless, _need_. The need to catch the Joker. To chase him. To feel his fist in the other man’s cheek, his hands around his throat.

He hears Dick and Barbara shouting. But cannot recognize the patterns of words. He feels himself move. Feels himself pushing at the thorns and branches. Feels it when the Joker goes down and god—it felt so good to have the clown underneath him. Batman grabs the lapels of the other man’s jacket, lifting him up and intending to throw him back onto the ground, into the dirt. But then another desire overwhelms him and he cannot stop himself.

Kissing the Joker is like swallowing bile. He tastes of blood and grim and insanity. Yet Bruce pushes his tongue against the madman’s lips and finds no resistance. Joker gladly opens for him. 

He thinks they fall into something. Onto something. Bruce is too far gone to tell. One moment they are horizontal and the next they are not. A sting of pain erupts around his mouth and Bruce pulls back. He licks the blood from his lips. Joker grins back, his own mouth bloody, and lifts a brow in challenge. Beneath the unending, maddening scream for pleasure in his guts. Bruce’s core sparks. He feels—excitement. Elated. He wants to take that challenge in Joker’s eyes _now_. Right now. Yes. _Yes_ , he wants it. 

Arms wrap around his neck and pull him back. Bruce snarls, fighting against the person. They can’t take this away from him! He needs it! He needs it so badly!

The Joker is snarling too. Fighting against Batgirl as she drags him away from Batman. Nightwing does his best to subdue him, and eventually Bruce realizes just who he is struggling against and immediately stills. His chest heaves with effort. His muscles straining to maintain control. He is slipping.

Slowly, Dick removes his hold from around Bruce’s head and takes a cautious step back. Batman breathes deeply, letting the air back into his lungs. He swallows shakily. He looks from Dick to Barbara. They blink at him with wide, terrified eyes. 

“I’m...” Bruce tries to muster up the last shreds of sanity. He cannot believe what he’d almost just done. Right in front of them. Right in front of them. He was better than that. He had to be.

“It’s okay.” Dicks says in a rushed tone. Though he cannot quite look Bruce in the eye. “It’s not your fault.”

Bruce nods, unable to do much of anything else. He would stand if he thought he could handle it. But the truth of it was, Bruce is terrified that if he moves again he’ll end up forcing himself upon whoever was closest to him. Be it Joker or Dick or Barbara. He clenches his teeth. _No_. He would never. Not to them. 

He watches as Barbara moves towards Dick. She says something to him that makes Dick harden his gaze and nod. And then Dick is dragging the Joker away. Walking further away from them, leaving Bruce alone with her.

Barbara breathes out. She straightens her back, determination in her shoulders. But her eyes are kind when they look upon him. Bruce recoils.

“We both know you’re not going to make it back to the cave in time.” She says gently. “It’s okay Bruce...I consent.”

Bruce twists his head away from her. A beastly snarl gurgling up his throat. 

“This is the farthest thing from consent!” He snaps angrily at her. Furious that she would do this. How dare she offer herself up like this? Like she knows what she’s getting into when she has no idea. 

“You don’t have another option!” She snaps right back. It takes only a second for Barbara to realize her mistake and she calmly and patiently reigns in her anger. She sighs, letting the tension roll off her back. “We’re both adults here Bruce. I don’t...I don’t mind. If it’s to save you I’ll gladly do it.”

The moment her hand touches his cheek the final string snaps. Barbara gasps as Bruce throws her to the ground. He presses his body onto her, pushing down, down into her place below him. His teeth clamp over her neck. She screams. He quickly muffles the sound with his hand, placing it over her mouth and squeezing. 

_Yesssss,_ his mind purrs. _Bind her. Keep her there. Take away her power. Make her fear you. Make her bleed._

Barbara kicks her legs up. Fighting desperately to get away, to get to safety. But there is no escape from the Batman. 

She does not know this man. She doesn’t recognize the satisfaction in his eyes as he holds her down. Nor in the pleasure he takes from her pain as he draws her blood. Bruce Wayne has always been a kind man. A gentle and patient man. He was, is, her mentor. Her partner. Her friend. 

This man is not Bruce. He is not Batman. She doesn’t know what he is. And she’s terrified.

She bites the finger that slips into her mouth and Bruce snarls in pain. He slams her head into the ground and she cries out. 

“Bruce! Bruce stop!” Please. Please let him hear her. Don’t let this happen. Not to them. Bruce will never forgive himself. And Barbara isn’t sure if she’d be able to either.

By some miracle. By God or the Devil, a glint of sanity catches in Bruce’s eyes. Barbara takes a vicious hold onto that light and hopes she can reach him.

“Bruce!” she tries and fails to keep the quiver out of her voice. Her face is covered in dirt and tears. “Bruce it’s me! It’s Barbara!”

The glint spreads outwards, filing the lines in Bruce’s face. The pressure stops, his body frozen. Barbara doesn’t dare reach out again. Knowing better than to touch him now.

“Please,” she whispers.

Bruce’s adam’s apple bobs in a hard swallow. He looks down at his comrade, sees the utter terror in her eyes. In that small moment, that tiny miniscule moment, the sheer guilt he feels overpowers his animal desire and he forces himself to let go. She quickly scrambles backwards, away from him. Away from his hands. 

Distantly, Bruce acknowledges that Barbara had been calling out his name. As if she’d thought he had lost sense of who she was as he was forcing himself upon her. As if he did not know who or where he was. But the truth was, the ugly, ugly truth, was that he had been fully aware the entire time. Of both of them. He just hadn’t cared.

“Go.” he rasps. Truly afraid of himself now.

Barbara nods quickly. She turns away from him, trying to get her shaking under control. She hurries in the direction Dick had gone. As she steps through the path Dick had made, she hears a monstrous cry from behind her. Agony beyond anything an ordinary human could bare. Her heart nearly stops in panic. Afraid Bruce will give chase. But roar quiets. she is not followed.

Barbara is momentarily relieved when she reaches the others. Dick is surprised to see her. But she shakes her head at him and turns to look away. The Joker is eying her up and down. A salacious grin on his face. As if he can read right through her. 

“What’s the matter sweetcheeks? Batsy a little too rough for you?”

“Shut up!” Nightwing snaps. But he turns to Barbara nonetheless. “Is he still—?”

Barbara wraps her arms around herself. She feels defeated. She couldn’t help him. She can’t. Dick swallows. He looks back towards where they’d left Bruce. She can see it in his eyes as he straightens his shoulders.

“I’ll go.”

Barbara stiffens. “No!”

The force of her protest is so powerful Dick takes a step back. He blinks at her, taking in her wet eyes, her rattled stance. 

“He’s...he’s not...” her eyes flick towards Joker. Angry that he’s here to witness this. Angry that he’s overhearing everything they’re saying. 

“What she’s trying to say Birdie is that your old man would tear you apart. And I don’t mean metaphorically.”

And that is the moment Barbara feels her composure snap. “Shut up! Just shut up! What the hell is wrong with you? You worked together with her didn’t you? You helped Ivy come up with that—whatever the fuck that was! What the hell did you do?!”

In the throes of unbearable desire, a gentle man would not act the way that Bruce had. If it had been about simply relieving himself, getting rid of the ache, it would’ve been another story. But there was something else about the way Bruce had acted. Something darker underneath his need for sex.

Joker grins at her showing all his teeth. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

“Yes.” she spits at him with all the hatred in her body. “I would. Now talk clown before I make you!”

Joker rolls his eyes. “Yeesh no patience at all I tell you. Kids today.”

“Now Joker!” Dick says.

“The aphrodisiac doesn’t just awaken your libido.” Joker says, smacking his lips. “It awakens your desires. Your darkest wants and impulses.” Green eyes lock with Barbara’s and she feels trapped. “What you saw back there? That was the real Batman sweetheart.”

She feels herself shaking her head. No. No that couldn’t be it. Bruce wasn’t like that. He was a good man. Honorable. 

Joker starts laughing, body shaking uncontrollably. Dick shoves him to the ground in disgust and reaches out to Barbara. She turns from his touch. She’s not ready to be held again yet.

“Don’t listen to him.” Dick says as soothingly as he can. “We’ll figure this out. We can—“

“No.”

Beyond the cackling madman and the silence of wind through the leaves, she can still hear Bruce’s call. He’s out there even now. Beating his knuckles against a tree, screaming into the air for release that will not come.

She shivers. “Let him go.”

Dick stops. “What?”

Joker hears her. His laughter cuts off with a choke. He lets her examine him. Let’s her look into the madness of his eyes and see there for herself what she could not provide for Batman. She could never give Bruce what he needed now. And God help her, but she understand that in this moment, crazy and desperate, that the Joker could.

She looks at Dick. “Let him go.”

Dick looks back towards the grinning clown and then to her. “You’re not serious! How could you even think that this is a good idea!”

“I never said it was a good idea!” she fires back at him. “But what other choice do we have?”

They could try to go back. Try to help Bruce make it through the brush to the other side. But Barbara knows he’d had be tied up at this point. He was too far gone. And she’s not sure her or Dick could manage to drag a struggling Batman through a wall of Poison Ivy’s plants.

Dick deflates, desperately grasping for something. Anything else but this. 

“You have no idea.” she says quietly. So quiet Dick can barely hear her. “No idea. I thought I did. But I was so, so wrong.”

Dick looks helplessly back at her.

“He’s the only one that can handle it.” She spits the words out like they have personally offended her. “The only one.”

Dick searches her eyes. Every instinct within him is telling him not to do this. But Barbara is resolute before him and he cannot think of another solution. 

The Joker is giggling to himself as Dick leans down to undo his handcuffs. T makes a show of stretching his arms over his head as he is released. 

“Don’t stay up too late kiddies!” he winks at them. “Mommy and Daddy are going to need some private time.”

He sprints towards the direction of Bruce’s faint roars. Cackling all the while. Barbara wonders briefly if Bruce would have rather woken up from his spell to discover a debauched Batgirl by his side, or an insane criminal. She has taken that decision away from him. She only hopes he’ll one day forgive her for it.

-

They don’t talk about it. It’s only when the silences between them get too large does her mind wander back to that day.

She remembers the waiting. The awful waiting. Dick pacing around her, then sitting, then standing, then pacing again.

They waited 30 minutes before trying his com. When Bruce had picked up Barbara had barely recognized his voice. It’d been low and raspy. Not like Batman’s growl. Like his breath had been stolen. Like his soul had been.

She remembers when he’d come out of the clearing with Joker in tow. Barbara had taken one look at them and immediately diverted her eyes.

They’d dropped the Joker at Arkham off before heading back home. In the corner of her eyes, she’d caught unwanted glimpses of the clown. He he’d been unconscious. His eternal smile still in place. Dried blood covered most of Batman’s mouth and hands. Wounds sported over Joker’s neck and down his clothes. His shirt ripped, tie in pieces, vest gone. There was one word for how they both looked and it popped into her head unbidden.

_Ravaged._

The staff would no doubt talk. Batman dropping off the Joker in such a state? Rumors were bound to happen. It’d made her sick to think they’d actually hold some truth this time. 

Bruce’s face had been set in a hard line the entire time. He seemed unshakable in his seat, like he was back to his old self. But a glance at his eyes, and Barbara could see the storm within. Although Joker was cuffed once more and passed out, Bruce’s hand had gripped the Joker’s form, unwilling to let the clown part from his side.

In the quiet of the plane, the undeniable truth they’d all known for years came to the front of their minds. Joker had never been subtle. Even in the beginning. He didn’t know how to be. His obsession had been obvious from the start. And despite his unconsciousness, the Joker looked far too content. 

She had given the Joker exactly what he’d wanted for so long. She’d delivered the Bat to him. Wrapped with a bow. She’d felt sick.

She doesn’t go out on patrol again for a while. Bruce never faults her for it. And she hates that she can’t even be mad at him for that.

-

Sometimes Bruce will stop and stare at a wall. His eyes glazed over in thought or memory. These moments are not new. Bruce was mostly always deep in thought about something. Some villainous scheme. A robbery. A clue. Thinking about his next move. His next plan. 

But instinctively she know this was not the same. Bruce is not thinking about how to break open his new case or test a new suit. He isn’t thinking about work at all.

His spine gives it away. The tiniest of shudders will start, rolling down his back. Remembering pale fingers clawing their way into his skin. His left hand will twitch then flex. Lost in the memory of clutching something he should never have touched.

Barbara hates herself for the question that never stops entering her mind in these moments. Hates that she can’t stop wondering the same thing over and over again.

Did he miss it?

She will never ask him. But it’s there all the same. In the moments Bruce is overcome with the memory of that night, is he craving Joker’s touch? Or is he relieving the horror?

She’s afraid of the answer. Because she thinks she already knows which answer it will be if she ever dares to ask.

**Author's Note:**

> I may or may not write a little excerpt of the actual sex scene. I had to cut it from the story because Barbara somehow inserted herself as the main narrator and it would have felt off to have it in there. I dunno.


End file.
